Living Well

Living Well has nothing to do with affluence, success measured in any way, or status. It is a mind set, an attitude that allows us to understand with great clarity the way the world really works, which has almost nothing to do with how we want it to work. A person who is Living Well flows smoothly with life's ups and downs, has given up the need to be right or to win, is fearlessly open, and has respect for others as a guiding principal. Living Well involves a fundamental reconfiguring of how we think, feel and act, and applying that new understanding every day. Life's challenges are not solely the result of a fast-paced environment or a complicated life. They come primarily from our misguided framing of the world, leading to distorted associations with and expectations of others, and to the desire that events favor us. The “world” we have constructed---the one that we think should, but seldom does, conform to our expectations---is an illusion, a false story that we act out causing both ourselves and others considerable difficulty. Simply and mistakenly, we believe what we think about the world and our role in it, and the cost is significant. The central theme of the book is the application of a new understanding of the world to our connections with others. Lacking this understanding, we maintain our skewed or false visions of how the world works, leading inexorably to poor behavior and poor interactions with others. But seeing clearly means we assist both ourselves and others to engage in quality interactions, with friends, family, colleagues, or even total strangers. We are no longer prisoners to a flawed view of reality that compromises Living Well.